Polish foreign minister urges NATO to intercept drones over Ukraine amid border spillover fears

Polish Foreign Affairs Minister Radosław Sikorski has urged Western allies to consider intercepting Russian drones and missiles over Ukrainian airspace, warning that Moscow’s escalating strikes are spilling into NATO territory. 

“Technically, as NATO and the EU, we would be capable of doing so,” Sikorski told German media, according to Tagesschau.

He stressed that the move could not be decided by Warsaw alone but required a united allied response.

His proposal comes days after nearly two dozen Russian drones violated Polish airspace on Sept. 10, with fragments and debris found in 17 localities across five provinces. The incident reignited debate over whether NATO should expand its air defense role to protect Ukraine, and by extension, its own eastern flank from Moscow’s increasingly reckless attacks. 

Sikorski also called for a coordinated maritime response to Russia’s covert fleet of aging oil tankers that are operating in the Baltic Sea. He cautioned that a single shipwreck could trigger “an environmental disaster of unprecedented scale” and suggested that NATO or Germany establish a maritime zone in the North Sea to monitor Russian traffic. 

The Ukrainian World Congress has strongly condemned Russia’s violation of Poland’s airspace, calling it “an act of aggression not only against a sovereign nation, but against NATO itself.”